The Job Market --
The job market continues to show mixed signals, as two separate reports released Wednesday showed that companies added more jobs in October, but announced more staff cuts to come. Private-sector employers added 43,000 jobs in October, according to a report by payroll processing firm Automatic Data Processing -- much better than 23,000 additional jobs expected by economists polled by Briefing.com. The increase follows a revised one-month decline in September of 2,000 private sector jobs, and seven previous months of increases. But overall, employers announced a total of 37,986 planned job cuts last month, up 2.2% from September, according to a separate report by outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas. Despite the month-over-month increase, cuts dropped nearly 32% versus October 2009, when employers announced 55,679. So far this year, job cuts have been below year-ago levels in every month.
Economic Activity --
Economic activity in the non-manufacturing sector grew in October for the 10th consecutive month, say the nation’s purchasing and supply executives in the latest Non-Manufacturing ISM Report On Business.
The report was issued today by Anthony Nieves, C.P.M., CFPM, chair of the Institute for Supply Management™ Non-Manufacturing Business Survey Committee; and senior vice president — supply management for Hilton Worldwide. “The NMI (Non-Manufacturing Index) registered 54.3% in October, 1.1 percentage points higher than the 53.2% registered in September, and indicating continued growth in the non-manufacturing sector at a slightly faster rate. The Non-Manufacturing Business Activity Index increased 5.6 percentage points to 58.4%, reflecting growth for the 11th consecutive month at a substantially faster rate than in September. The New Orders Index increased 1.8 percentage points to 56.7%, and the Employment Index increased 0.7 percentage point to 50.9%, indicating growth in employment for the second consecutive month and the fourth time in the last six months. The Prices Index increased 8.2 percentage points to 68.3%, indicating that prices increased significantly faster in October. According to the NMI, 11 non-manufacturing industries reported growth in October. Respondents’ comments remain mixed about business conditions and vary by industry and company. The trend of the overall comments indicates that there are signs of economic stabilization.”
Manufactured Goods --
The Commerce Department said orders for manufactured goods increased 2.1% after being flat in August. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast factory orders rebounding 1.6% in September from a previously reported 0.5% fall in August. There have been fears that manufacturing, which is leading the economy's sluggish recovery from its longest recession since the 1930s, was slowing sharply, but these concerns continue to be allayed by both regional and national factory surveys. Data this week showed the Institute for Supply Management's index of national factory activity rose in October to its highest level since May.
In September, orders excluding transportation rose 0.4% after a 1.3% increase in August, the Commerce Department said. But orders for non-defense capital goods excluding aircraft, seen as a measure of business confidence, slipped 0.2% after increasing 5.1% in August. Unfilled orders at U.S. factories increased 1.0% in September, the largest rise since March 2008, after a 0.2% gain in August.
Shipments rose 0.4% in September after a small decline in August, while inventories for manufactured durable goods were up for the ninth successive month. That left the inventories-to-shipment ratio, a measure of how long it would take to deplete current stocks, unchanged at 1.27 months' worth. The department revised durable goods orders for September to show a 3.5% increase rather than the previously reported 3.3% gain. Excluding transportation, orders for durable goods fell a smaller 0.4% in September instead of 0.8%.
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